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Arctic Wetland Dynamics in Finland

Hi Carol,

I hope you are having an awesome time on your PolarTREC adventure....mine was absolutely amazing.

We came up with a question or two here at Nobleboro Central School in Maine....

We are accustomed to our "Birch Trees" here in Maine and are wondering if there are any similarities between what we know as birch trees compared with what looks like a ground cover. Is Mountain Birch deciduous? How big does it Get? When decimated by the moths do individual plants recover?

A related question would be whether or not the moths are considered a pest and if anything is done to try and minimize or stop their impact?

Take care,

Ken Williams and NCS 7th and 8th grade students

Sun, 05/26/2013 - 21:45

Carol Scott

Hello Mr. Will and his awesome students -Glad you had a most excellent adventure, and yes, I too am having a
fantastic time on my PolarTREC expedition.
You have some good questions here about the tunturitkoivu, or mountain
birch. So far the tallest I have seen are perhaps 30 feet tall. I have
not seen anything like the tall, straight, single trunks of the white or
paper birch that I think grows in Maine (and in Alaska). They tend to
grow in clumps, with multiple stems, as they mostly reproduce
vegetatively (asexually as opposed to sexual reproduction). The tree
clumps the researchers put the enclosures around are small specimens of
the species.
The mountain birch is definitely deciduous, and bud burst has happened
in the last week since I have arrived. The fells around Kevo (the
hillsides) are greening up. The individual plants can recover up to a
point after the moth caterpillars have eaten all the leaves. However,
it is not until the next spring that they will put out new leaves. From
what I understand so far, if the moths eat the leaves a second or third
year in a row, the tree will die. On my trip to Varanger Fjord
yesterday I did see large areas of dead birch, killed by the moths.
The moths are definitely considered a pest, but I will have to ask more
questions here before I can tell you if anything is being done to stop
or minimize their impacts.
Thanks for the great questions, and keep them coming!
Carol